Virgin Galactic has revealed its wish to offer passengers a flight service between London and Sydney which will take around two and a half hours, yahoo.com reports.

Speaking at the Wired 2013 event, representatives from Richard Branson’s spaceflight company told delegates that they are hopeful of providing the super-quick jet service at some point in the future, using its SpaceShip 2 for long-haul flights.

Success would mean that the arduous 24-hour (minimum) journey between the English and Australian capitals would be so significantly reduced, that Sydneysiders might be able to ‘pop’ over to London for a meeting and back in just one day.

The flights would be possible due to the ship’s ability to travel at the very edge of space, re-entering for landing. That would enable it to cover vast distances in short amounts of time.

What’s more, according to Virgin Galactic commercial director Stephen Attenborough, the space flights could provide environmental benefits, as any emissions are released outside the earth’s atmosphere – a fact that might pique the interest of eco-conscious business travellers.

Attenborough told wired.co.uk that the chances of commercial space aviation depended first on the success of the company’s space tourism aspirations.

“If we can get this first step right, take people into space and keep them safe in commercially viable aircraft, the aim [is] to try and push long haul aviation above the fragile atmosphere into space.